Biden's Win Trades One Political Fantasy For Another

[Indeependent]

This is a commentary on our media today, but also on our whole culture. It seems to me interesting and mostly accurate. Does it get you thinking about anything? Not looking for partisan polemic here, so much as reflection on living in political — or other — fantasies. As an old retired guy I personally have time to watch sci-fi or Marvel fantasies all day long. I’ve traveled all over the world and I must say one thing about U.S. TV and film culture (I don’t do gaming): nobody does entertainment and fantasy as well as we do. I’m reminded of an old saying I first heard from a conservative South American friend: “Americans are the best entertained and the worst informed people in the whole world.”

***

Today, the liberal U.S. establishment is congratulating itself for having waged a resistance to authoritarianism... What is playing out is an increasingly extreme divergence of narrative from reality, on all sides: a phenomenon that some have termed “political virtualism,” or even “dreampolitik.”

Among the conservative base, there is no consensus about accepting the unfavorable election results and moving on. Instead, the fantasies everywhere seem to be getting more powerful....

The fantasy of a planet led by a benevolent liberal hegemon has proven no less destructive in reality than Trump’s strongman appeal ... Unsustainable on its own terms, the benevolent hegemon narrative appears to be undergoing a slow and painful collapse....

OUR WIDER CULTURE is to blame for this style of American virtual politics.... Foretold by certain far-sighted U.S. commentators in the past, entertainment has so thoroughly colonized all spheres of life that the election of a reality television star as president becomes not just possible but a logical outcome.

AT THE START of the information age — decades before social media, reality television, and cable news — the historian Daniel Boorstin warned that such a challenge to American democracy was on the horizon: the threat of fantasy. As Boorstin wrote in his 1962 book “The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America,” an extremely powerful culture industry had already begun to reshape the consciousness of Americans in a way that could blind them to the realities of their own country....

To put it another way, the channel is being changed from “The Apprentice” back to “The West Wing.”

Biden’s Win Trades One Political Fantasy for Another



Please do not use caps with thread titles. Thank you. Tom Paine 1949

This article and that Times itself, are, sort of ironic reflections of the very things this piece is talking about.

Both are Gas Lights, and no where in either do they, I am sure, really ever want to mention the role of NGO's, corporate supported foundations, or the interlocking directorate in forming the global fascism that supports the consensus of Neo-liberalism and Neo-conservatism.

I mean hell, that whole thing about twitter blacklisting a legitimate story about Hunter Biden, and Facebook doing the same, (that NY Post story,) and then, as soon as the election is over, it coming out as true?

. . . and WHAT THE FUCK?! The INTERCEPT, sure has balls of steel and is hypocritical as hell, running a story like this, when they participated in THIS SAME DAMN SHIT?!


Are we supposed to take them seriously now?!!!

I say, FUCK OFF!

Tech censorship: how paranoid should we be?

Recently, in the comments underneath our LockdownTV YouTube videos, people have been saying that our videos are being ‘downrated’ on YouTube search. Type in Aella, or Michael Levitt, for example, and videos come above ours in the search results that are much older, viewed much fewer times, and...

unherd.com

Thanks for this interesting “Unherd” interview with the courageous journalist Glenn Greenwald, whose opinions are always worth considering carefully. Greenwald is a “leftist” now risking his life exposing the powers that be in Brazil. As I’m sure you know, he recently resigned from The Intercept, which he co-founded. I think the Intercept is still worth following, though I certainly don’t agree with everything I read there.

I think Greenwald, who famously assisted Julian Assange in getting his early whistle-blowing exposes published in major papers around the world, Assange himself, and the plight of Ed Snowden, all show how difficult it is to avoid being “played,” how difficult it is to thread the needle between corporate or popular fantasy in the U.S., foreign and domestic institutions ... to “speak truth to power” in our era.

I disagree that the big corporate media ignoring Hunter Biden news (and all the rest) is somehow a sign of “global fascism.” The Democrats and big corporate establishment media certainly played hardball with the Republicans and Trump ... but that is not fascism. The liberal Establishment media is losing its grip, and Section 230 should be revoked to break up social media monopolies, but none of what they did amounts to “fascism” — anymore than what Trumpsters tried to do all along. It was indeed just “virtual dream politics” invading the world of real politics once again.

Let's look at the definition of fascism, shall we?


fas·cism
(făsh′ĭz′əm)
n.
1. often Fascism
a. A system of government marked by centralization of authority under a dictator, a capitalist economy subject to stringent governmental controls, violent suppression of the opposition, and typically a policy of belligerent nationalism and racism.
b. A political philosophy or movement based on or advocating such a system of government.
2. Oppressive, dictatorial control.

fascism

Definition, Synonyms, Translations of fascism by The Free Dictionary

www.thefreedictionary.com

Now, while it is true, we do not have a dictator in our world paradigm of fascism, I would maintain, that all other elements seem to be coming to fruition.

Fascism - Authoritarianism, Nationalism, Militarism

Fascism - Authoritarianism, Nationalism, Militarism: There has been considerable disagreement among historians and political scientists about the nature of fascism. Some scholars, for example, regard it as a socially radical movement with ideological ties to the Jacobins of the French...

www.britannica.com

The most important, and premier element of fascism, is the dirigiste economic model, where NGO's, Foundations, and corporations are given official or unofficial control over large sections of governing power. This has clearly become the norm in most supposedly democratic nation's and their institutions. It is why most folks do not trust them anymore. If we look at the World Economic Forum, or the World Health Organization, and the various memberships associated with it, it is now clear, what is driving all policiy in professional organizations, and the world propaganda in the press. Representative government, and objective scienctific debate have no place in society anymore, it is all bully tactics and oppression from the global fascists.

Billionaires and their trillion dollar multi-national corporations, along with their bullshit propaganda do more to move populations than democratic norms.


Big tech is starting to censor all voices of dissent, and in all likelihood was instrumental in putting their guy in the White House.

Big Media has created a false narrative that ethnicity is what is important, not character, going so far as demonizing police forces for doing their job when it comes to go after criminals, regardless of their race. This is, obviously using race. . a FASCIST characteristic in politics, to divide people by race.

. . . and the entire corporate/government media complex is moving us toward an economic system that is not longer free. Small business are going out of business, and it is all planned with these revolving lock-downs which are not based on science.

That CARES ACT funneled billions of dollars to the biggest companies, while leaving the poor and small businesses to suffer and die. . . .

THAT IS FASCISM.

It is just pure “dreampolitik” and fantasy to confuse the Western liberal imperial order with fascism. Neither right nor left wing populism, not social democracy / democratic socialism, not small bourgeois democracies nor our giant corporate-dominated Federal republic can be labeled “fascist.”

“Global fascism” is even a more ridiculous fantasy description of the present world reality, in which Chinese and Russian state capitalism remain politically independent of Wall Street’s liberal / neo-con corporate system.

Your talk of “NGO's, corporate supported foundations, or the interlocking directorate ... forming the global fascism that supports the consensus of Neo-liberalism and Neo-conservatism” inserts the word “fascism” without sense or purpose whatever. Using dictionary definitions is childish, but even the ones you quoted make it clear we are NOT living under “fascism” in any sense but the surreal.

Of course the violence and terrors of life in many third world countries, or countries torn apart to serve imperialism, means the Western “liberal world order” is a nightmare for them. When you are dead it doesn’t matter whether a liberal or neo-con soldier dropped the bomb on your head, or if it was a real fascist in the pay of some lunatic fuhrer.

But it is as clear as can be that you and I are NOT living under a fascist world order. Not under Biden, and not under Trump. That is a political fantasy pushed by partisan hysterics who have never experienced or even studied real fascism.

I would argue that while we are certainly not living under fascism (and I think we can thank our Constitution and the wisdom of our founders in making it very hard to alter) for that) - there have been some very disturbing echos of some of it’s rhetoric in our current administration.

Be specific.

 

[Coyote]

Be specific.

See my prior post.

 

[progressive hunter]

This is a commentary on our media today, but also on our whole culture. It seems to me interesting and mostly accurate. Does it get you thinking about anything? Not looking for partisan polemic here, so much as reflection on living in political — or other — fantasies. As an old retired guy I personally have time to watch sci-fi or Marvel fantasies all day long. I’ve traveled all over the world and I must say one thing about U.S. TV and film culture (I don’t do gaming): nobody does entertainment and fantasy as well as we do. I’m reminded of an old saying I first heard from a conservative South American friend: “Americans are the best entertained and the worst informed people in the whole world.”

***

Today, the liberal U.S. establishment is congratulating itself for having waged a resistance to authoritarianism... What is playing out is an increasingly extreme divergence of narrative from reality, on all sides: a phenomenon that some have termed “political virtualism,” or even “dreampolitik.”

Among the conservative base, there is no consensus about accepting the unfavorable election results and moving on. Instead, the fantasies everywhere seem to be getting more powerful....

The fantasy of a planet led by a benevolent liberal hegemon has proven no less destructive in reality than Trump’s strongman appeal ... Unsustainable on its own terms, the benevolent hegemon narrative appears to be undergoing a slow and painful collapse....

OUR WIDER CULTURE is to blame for this style of American virtual politics.... Foretold by certain far-sighted U.S. commentators in the past, entertainment has so thoroughly colonized all spheres of life that the election of a reality television star as president becomes not just possible but a logical outcome.

AT THE START of the information age — decades before social media, reality television, and cable news — the historian Daniel Boorstin warned that such a challenge to American democracy was on the horizon: the threat of fantasy. As Boorstin wrote in his 1962 book “The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America,” an extremely powerful culture industry had already begun to reshape the consciousness of Americans in a way that could blind them to the realities of their own country....

To put it another way, the channel is being changed from “The Apprentice” back to “The West Wing.”

Biden’s Win Trades One Political Fantasy for Another



Please do not use caps with thread titles. Thank you. Tom Paine 1949

This article and that Times itself, are, sort of ironic reflections of the very things this piece is talking about.

Both are Gas Lights, and no where in either do they, I am sure, really ever want to mention the role of NGO's, corporate supported foundations, or the interlocking directorate in forming the global fascism that supports the consensus of Neo-liberalism and Neo-conservatism.

I mean hell, that whole thing about twitter blacklisting a legitimate story about Hunter Biden, and Facebook doing the same, (that NY Post story,) and then, as soon as the election is over, it coming out as true?

. . . and WHAT THE FUCK?! The INTERCEPT, sure has balls of steel and is hypocritical as hell, running a story like this, when they participated in THIS SAME DAMN SHIT?!


Are we supposed to take them seriously now?!!!

I say, FUCK OFF!

Tech censorship: how paranoid should we be?

Recently, in the comments underneath our LockdownTV YouTube videos, people have been saying that our videos are being ‘downrated’ on YouTube search. Type in Aella, or Michael Levitt, for example, and videos come above ours in the search results that are much older, viewed much fewer times, and...

unherd.com

Thanks for this interesting “Unherd” interview with the courageous journalist Glenn Greenwald, whose opinions are always worth considering carefully. Greenwald is a “leftist” now risking his life exposing the powers that be in Brazil. As I’m sure you know, he recently resigned from The Intercept, which he co-founded. I think the Intercept is still worth following, though I certainly don’t agree with everything I read there.

I think Greenwald, who famously assisted Julian Assange in getting his early whistle-blowing exposes published in major papers around the world, Assange himself, and the plight of Ed Snowden, all show how difficult it is to avoid being “played,” how difficult it is to thread the needle between corporate or popular fantasy in the U.S., foreign and domestic institutions ... to “speak truth to power” in our era.

I disagree that the big corporate media ignoring Hunter Biden news (and all the rest) is somehow a sign of “global fascism.” The Democrats and big corporate establishment media certainly played hardball with the Republicans and Trump ... but that is not fascism. The liberal Establishment media is losing its grip, and Section 230 should be revoked to break up social media monopolies, but none of what they did amounts to “fascism” — anymore than what Trumpsters tried to do all along. It was indeed just “virtual dream politics” invading the world of real politics once again.

Let's look at the definition of fascism, shall we?


fas·cism
(făsh′ĭz′əm)
n.
1. often Fascism
a. A system of government marked by centralization of authority under a dictator, a capitalist economy subject to stringent governmental controls, violent suppression of the opposition, and typically a policy of belligerent nationalism and racism.
b. A political philosophy or movement based on or advocating such a system of government.
2. Oppressive, dictatorial control.

fascism

Definition, Synonyms, Translations of fascism by The Free Dictionary

www.thefreedictionary.com

Now, while it is true, we do not have a dictator in our world paradigm of fascism, I would maintain, that all other elements seem to be coming to fruition.

Fascism - Authoritarianism, Nationalism, Militarism

Fascism - Authoritarianism, Nationalism, Militarism: There has been considerable disagreement among historians and political scientists about the nature of fascism. Some scholars, for example, regard it as a socially radical movement with ideological ties to the Jacobins of the French...

www.britannica.com

The most important, and premier element of fascism, is the dirigiste economic model, where NGO's, Foundations, and corporations are given official or unofficial control over large sections of governing power. This has clearly become the norm in most supposedly democratic nation's and their institutions. It is why most folks do not trust them anymore. If we look at the World Economic Forum, or the World Health Organization, and the various memberships associated with it, it is now clear, what is driving all policiy in professional organizations, and the world propaganda in the press. Representative government, and objective scienctific debate have no place in society anymore, it is all bully tactics and oppression from the global fascists.

Billionaires and their trillion dollar multi-national corporations, along with their bullshit propaganda do more to move populations than democratic norms.


Big tech is starting to censor all voices of dissent, and in all likelihood was instrumental in putting their guy in the White House.

Big Media has created a false narrative that ethnicity is what is important, not character, going so far as demonizing police forces for doing their job when it comes to go after criminals, regardless of their race. This is, obviously using race. . a FASCIST characteristic in politics, to divide people by race.

. . . and the entire corporate/government media complex is moving us toward an economic system that is not longer free. Small business are going out of business, and it is all planned with these revolving lock-downs which are not based on science.

That CARES ACT funneled billions of dollars to the biggest companies, while leaving the poor and small businesses to suffer and die. . . .

THAT IS FASCISM.

It is just pure “dreampolitik” and fantasy to confuse the Western liberal imperial order with fascism. Neither right nor left wing populism, not social democracy / democratic socialism, not small bourgeois democracies nor our giant corporate-dominated Federal republic can be labeled “fascist.”

“Global fascism” is even a more ridiculous fantasy description of the present world reality, in which Chinese and Russian state capitalism remain politically independent of Wall Street’s liberal / neo-con corporate system.

Your talk of “NGO's, corporate supported foundations, or the interlocking directorate ... forming the global fascism that supports the consensus of Neo-liberalism and Neo-conservatism” inserts the word “fascism” without sense or purpose whatever. Using dictionary definitions is childish, but even the ones you quoted make it clear we are NOT living under “fascism” in any sense but the surreal.

Of course the violence and terrors of life in many third world countries, or countries torn apart to serve imperialism, means the Western “liberal world order” is a nightmare for them. When you are dead it doesn’t matter whether a liberal or neo-con soldier dropped the bomb on your head, or if it was a real fascist in the pay of some lunatic fuhrer.

But it is as clear as can be that you and I are NOT living under a fascist world order. Not under Biden, and not under Trump. That is a political fantasy pushed by partisan hysterics who have never experienced or even studied real fascism.

I would argue that while we are certainly not living under fascism (and I think we can thank our Constitution and the wisdom of our founders in making it very hard to alter) for that) - there have been some very disturbing echos of some of it’s rhetoric in our current administration.

dont forget anything you complain about trump doing in that direction the dems are calling for far worse,,,

 

[Indeependent]

This is a commentary on our media today, but also on our whole culture. It seems to me interesting and mostly accurate. Does it get you thinking about anything? Not looking for partisan polemic here, so much as reflection on living in political — or other — fantasies. As an old retired guy I personally have time to watch sci-fi or Marvel fantasies all day long. I’ve traveled all over the world and I must say one thing about U.S. TV and film culture (I don’t do gaming): nobody does entertainment and fantasy as well as we do. I’m reminded of an old saying I first heard from a conservative South American friend: “Americans are the best entertained and the worst informed people in the whole world.”

***

Today, the liberal U.S. establishment is congratulating itself for having waged a resistance to authoritarianism... What is playing out is an increasingly extreme divergence of narrative from reality, on all sides: a phenomenon that some have termed “political virtualism,” or even “dreampolitik.”

Among the conservative base, there is no consensus about accepting the unfavorable election results and moving on. Instead, the fantasies everywhere seem to be getting more powerful....

The fantasy of a planet led by a benevolent liberal hegemon has proven no less destructive in reality than Trump’s strongman appeal ... Unsustainable on its own terms, the benevolent hegemon narrative appears to be undergoing a slow and painful collapse....

OUR WIDER CULTURE is to blame for this style of American virtual politics.... Foretold by certain far-sighted U.S. commentators in the past, entertainment has so thoroughly colonized all spheres of life that the election of a reality television star as president becomes not just possible but a logical outcome.

AT THE START of the information age — decades before social media, reality television, and cable news — the historian Daniel Boorstin warned that such a challenge to American democracy was on the horizon: the threat of fantasy. As Boorstin wrote in his 1962 book “The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America,” an extremely powerful culture industry had already begun to reshape the consciousness of Americans in a way that could blind them to the realities of their own country....

To put it another way, the channel is being changed from “The Apprentice” back to “The West Wing.”

Biden’s Win Trades One Political Fantasy for Another



Please do not use caps with thread titles. Thank you. Tom Paine 1949

This article and that Times itself, are, sort of ironic reflections of the very things this piece is talking about.

Both are Gas Lights, and no where in either do they, I am sure, really ever want to mention the role of NGO's, corporate supported foundations, or the interlocking directorate in forming the global fascism that supports the consensus of Neo-liberalism and Neo-conservatism.

I mean hell, that whole thing about twitter blacklisting a legitimate story about Hunter Biden, and Facebook doing the same, (that NY Post story,) and then, as soon as the election is over, it coming out as true?

. . . and WHAT THE FUCK?! The INTERCEPT, sure has balls of steel and is hypocritical as hell, running a story like this, when they participated in THIS SAME DAMN SHIT?!


Are we supposed to take them seriously now?!!!

I say, FUCK OFF!

Tech censorship: how paranoid should we be?

Recently, in the comments underneath our LockdownTV YouTube videos, people have been saying that our videos are being ‘downrated’ on YouTube search. Type in Aella, or Michael Levitt, for example, and videos come above ours in the search results that are much older, viewed much fewer times, and...

unherd.com

Thanks for this interesting “Unherd” interview with the courageous journalist Glenn Greenwald, whose opinions are always worth considering carefully. Greenwald is a “leftist” now risking his life exposing the powers that be in Brazil. As I’m sure you know, he recently resigned from The Intercept, which he co-founded. I think the Intercept is still worth following, though I certainly don’t agree with everything I read there.

I think Greenwald, who famously assisted Julian Assange in getting his early whistle-blowing exposes published in major papers around the world, Assange himself, and the plight of Ed Snowden, all show how difficult it is to avoid being “played,” how difficult it is to thread the needle between corporate or popular fantasy in the U.S., foreign and domestic institutions ... to “speak truth to power” in our era.

I disagree that the big corporate media ignoring Hunter Biden news (and all the rest) is somehow a sign of “global fascism.” The Democrats and big corporate establishment media certainly played hardball with the Republicans and Trump ... but that is not fascism. The liberal Establishment media is losing its grip, and Section 230 should be revoked to break up social media monopolies, but none of what they did amounts to “fascism” — anymore than what Trumpsters tried to do all along. It was indeed just “virtual dream politics” invading the world of real politics once again.

Let's look at the definition of fascism, shall we?


fas·cism
(făsh′ĭz′əm)
n.
1. often Fascism
a. A system of government marked by centralization of authority under a dictator, a capitalist economy subject to stringent governmental controls, violent suppression of the opposition, and typically a policy of belligerent nationalism and racism.
b. A political philosophy or movement based on or advocating such a system of government.
2. Oppressive, dictatorial control.

fascism

Definition, Synonyms, Translations of fascism by The Free Dictionary

www.thefreedictionary.com

Now, while it is true, we do not have a dictator in our world paradigm of fascism, I would maintain, that all other elements seem to be coming to fruition.

Fascism - Authoritarianism, Nationalism, Militarism

Fascism - Authoritarianism, Nationalism, Militarism: There has been considerable disagreement among historians and political scientists about the nature of fascism. Some scholars, for example, regard it as a socially radical movement with ideological ties to the Jacobins of the French...

www.britannica.com

The most important, and premier element of fascism, is the dirigiste economic model, where NGO's, Foundations, and corporations are given official or unofficial control over large sections of governing power. This has clearly become the norm in most supposedly democratic nation's and their institutions. It is why most folks do not trust them anymore. If we look at the World Economic Forum, or the World Health Organization, and the various memberships associated with it, it is now clear, what is driving all policiy in professional organizations, and the world propaganda in the press. Representative government, and objective scienctific debate have no place in society anymore, it is all bully tactics and oppression from the global fascists.

Billionaires and their trillion dollar multi-national corporations, along with their bullshit propaganda do more to move populations than democratic norms.


Big tech is starting to censor all voices of dissent, and in all likelihood was instrumental in putting their guy in the White House.

Big Media has created a false narrative that ethnicity is what is important, not character, going so far as demonizing police forces for doing their job when it comes to go after criminals, regardless of their race. This is, obviously using race. . a FASCIST characteristic in politics, to divide people by race.

. . . and the entire corporate/government media complex is moving us toward an economic system that is not longer free. Small business are going out of business, and it is all planned with these revolving lock-downs which are not based on science.

That CARES ACT funneled billions of dollars to the biggest companies, while leaving the poor and small businesses to suffer and die. . . .

THAT IS FASCISM.

It is just pure “dreampolitik” and fantasy to confuse the Western liberal imperial order with fascism. Neither right nor left wing populism, not social democracy / democratic socialism, not small bourgeois democracies nor our giant corporate-dominated Federal republic can be labeled “fascist.”

“Global fascism” is even a more ridiculous fantasy description of the present world reality, in which Chinese and Russian state capitalism remain politically independent of Wall Street’s liberal / neo-con corporate system.

Your talk of “NGO's, corporate supported foundations, or the interlocking directorate ... forming the global fascism that supports the consensus of Neo-liberalism and Neo-conservatism” inserts the word “fascism” without sense or purpose whatever. Using dictionary definitions is childish, but even the ones you quoted make it clear we are NOT living under “fascism” in any sense but the surreal.

Of course the violence and terrors of life in many third world countries, or countries torn apart to serve imperialism, means the Western “liberal world order” is a nightmare for them. When you are dead it doesn’t matter whether a liberal or neo-con soldier dropped the bomb on your head, or if it was a real fascist in the pay of some lunatic fuhrer.

But it is as clear as can be that you and I are NOT living under a fascist world order. Not under Biden, and not under Trump. That is a political fantasy pushed by partisan hysterics who have never experienced or even studied real fascism.

I would argue that while we are certainly not living under fascism (and I think we can thank our Constitution and the wisdom of our founders in making it very hard to alter) for that) - there have been some very disturbing echos of some of it’s rhetoric in our current administration.

Oh, for crying out loud! What utter nonsense. What, precisely, are these "disturbing echo[e]s" of fascism from the current administration?

“disturbing echos in some of it’s rhetoric”

Such as?

Rather than repeat it here, I discusses it in this post: GREAT LEADER blames DOJ and FBI for rigging election

I think there are some similarities, but I also think our constitution prevents it. The article is really an interesting read.

Dumbest posy of the hour.
I thought you ere referring to all the Democrats actually destroying thousands of businesses and people's lives.

 

[progressive hunter]

This is a commentary on our media today, but also on our whole culture. It seems to me interesting and mostly accurate. Does it get you thinking about anything? Not looking for partisan polemic here, so much as reflection on living in political — or other — fantasies. As an old retired guy I personally have time to watch sci-fi or Marvel fantasies all day long. I’ve traveled all over the world and I must say one thing about U.S. TV and film culture (I don’t do gaming): nobody does entertainment and fantasy as well as we do. I’m reminded of an old saying I first heard from a conservative South American friend: “Americans are the best entertained and the worst informed people in the whole world.”

***

Today, the liberal U.S. establishment is congratulating itself for having waged a resistance to authoritarianism... What is playing out is an increasingly extreme divergence of narrative from reality, on all sides: a phenomenon that some have termed “political virtualism,” or even “dreampolitik.”

Among the conservative base, there is no consensus about accepting the unfavorable election results and moving on. Instead, the fantasies everywhere seem to be getting more powerful....

The fantasy of a planet led by a benevolent liberal hegemon has proven no less destructive in reality than Trump’s strongman appeal ... Unsustainable on its own terms, the benevolent hegemon narrative appears to be undergoing a slow and painful collapse....

OUR WIDER CULTURE is to blame for this style of American virtual politics.... Foretold by certain far-sighted U.S. commentators in the past, entertainment has so thoroughly colonized all spheres of life that the election of a reality television star as president becomes not just possible but a logical outcome.

AT THE START of the information age — decades before social media, reality television, and cable news — the historian Daniel Boorstin warned that such a challenge to American democracy was on the horizon: the threat of fantasy. As Boorstin wrote in his 1962 book “The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America,” an extremely powerful culture industry had already begun to reshape the consciousness of Americans in a way that could blind them to the realities of their own country....

To put it another way, the channel is being changed from “The Apprentice” back to “The West Wing.”

Biden’s Win Trades One Political Fantasy for Another



Please do not use caps with thread titles. Thank you. Tom Paine 1949

This article and that Times itself, are, sort of ironic reflections of the very things this piece is talking about.

Both are Gas Lights, and no where in either do they, I am sure, really ever want to mention the role of NGO's, corporate supported foundations, or the interlocking directorate in forming the global fascism that supports the consensus of Neo-liberalism and Neo-conservatism.

I mean hell, that whole thing about twitter blacklisting a legitimate story about Hunter Biden, and Facebook doing the same, (that NY Post story,) and then, as soon as the election is over, it coming out as true?

. . . and WHAT THE FUCK?! The INTERCEPT, sure has balls of steel and is hypocritical as hell, running a story like this, when they participated in THIS SAME DAMN SHIT?!


Are we supposed to take them seriously now?!!!

I say, FUCK OFF!

Tech censorship: how paranoid should we be?

Recently, in the comments underneath our LockdownTV YouTube videos, people have been saying that our videos are being ‘downrated’ on YouTube search. Type in Aella, or Michael Levitt, for example, and videos come above ours in the search results that are much older, viewed much fewer times, and...

unherd.com

Thanks for this interesting “Unherd” interview with the courageous journalist Glenn Greenwald, whose opinions are always worth considering carefully. Greenwald is a “leftist” now risking his life exposing the powers that be in Brazil. As I’m sure you know, he recently resigned from The Intercept, which he co-founded. I think the Intercept is still worth following, though I certainly don’t agree with everything I read there.

I think Greenwald, who famously assisted Julian Assange in getting his early whistle-blowing exposes published in major papers around the world, Assange himself, and the plight of Ed Snowden, all show how difficult it is to avoid being “played,” how difficult it is to thread the needle between corporate or popular fantasy in the U.S., foreign and domestic institutions ... to “speak truth to power” in our era.

I disagree that the big corporate media ignoring Hunter Biden news (and all the rest) is somehow a sign of “global fascism.” The Democrats and big corporate establishment media certainly played hardball with the Republicans and Trump ... but that is not fascism. The liberal Establishment media is losing its grip, and Section 230 should be revoked to break up social media monopolies, but none of what they did amounts to “fascism” — anymore than what Trumpsters tried to do all along. It was indeed just “virtual dream politics” invading the world of real politics once again.

Let's look at the definition of fascism, shall we?


fas·cism
(făsh′ĭz′əm)
n.
1. often Fascism
a. A system of government marked by centralization of authority under a dictator, a capitalist economy subject to stringent governmental controls, violent suppression of the opposition, and typically a policy of belligerent nationalism and racism.
b. A political philosophy or movement based on or advocating such a system of government.
2. Oppressive, dictatorial control.

fascism

Definition, Synonyms, Translations of fascism by The Free Dictionary

www.thefreedictionary.com

Now, while it is true, we do not have a dictator in our world paradigm of fascism, I would maintain, that all other elements seem to be coming to fruition.

Fascism - Authoritarianism, Nationalism, Militarism

Fascism - Authoritarianism, Nationalism, Militarism: There has been considerable disagreement among historians and political scientists about the nature of fascism. Some scholars, for example, regard it as a socially radical movement with ideological ties to the Jacobins of the French...

www.britannica.com

The most important, and premier element of fascism, is the dirigiste economic model, where NGO's, Foundations, and corporations are given official or unofficial control over large sections of governing power. This has clearly become the norm in most supposedly democratic nation's and their institutions. It is why most folks do not trust them anymore. If we look at the World Economic Forum, or the World Health Organization, and the various memberships associated with it, it is now clear, what is driving all policiy in professional organizations, and the world propaganda in the press. Representative government, and objective scienctific debate have no place in society anymore, it is all bully tactics and oppression from the global fascists.

Billionaires and their trillion dollar multi-national corporations, along with their bullshit propaganda do more to move populations than democratic norms.


Big tech is starting to censor all voices of dissent, and in all likelihood was instrumental in putting their guy in the White House.

Big Media has created a false narrative that ethnicity is what is important, not character, going so far as demonizing police forces for doing their job when it comes to go after criminals, regardless of their race. This is, obviously using race. . a FASCIST characteristic in politics, to divide people by race.

. . . and the entire corporate/government media complex is moving us toward an economic system that is not longer free. Small business are going out of business, and it is all planned with these revolving lock-downs which are not based on science.

That CARES ACT funneled billions of dollars to the biggest companies, while leaving the poor and small businesses to suffer and die. . . .

THAT IS FASCISM.

It is just pure “dreampolitik” and fantasy to confuse the Western liberal imperial order with fascism. Neither right nor left wing populism, not social democracy / democratic socialism, not small bourgeois democracies nor our giant corporate-dominated Federal republic can be labeled “fascist.”

“Global fascism” is even a more ridiculous fantasy description of the present world reality, in which Chinese and Russian state capitalism remain politically independent of Wall Street’s liberal / neo-con corporate system.

Your talk of “NGO's, corporate supported foundations, or the interlocking directorate ... forming the global fascism that supports the consensus of Neo-liberalism and Neo-conservatism” inserts the word “fascism” without sense or purpose whatever. Using dictionary definitions is childish, but even the ones you quoted make it clear we are NOT living under “fascism” in any sense but the surreal.

Of course the violence and terrors of life in many third world countries, or countries torn apart to serve imperialism, means the Western “liberal world order” is a nightmare for them. When you are dead it doesn’t matter whether a liberal or neo-con soldier dropped the bomb on your head, or if it was a real fascist in the pay of some lunatic fuhrer.

But it is as clear as can be that you and I are NOT living under a fascist world order. Not under Biden, and not under Trump. That is a political fantasy pushed by partisan hysterics who have never experienced or even studied real fascism.

I would argue that while we are certainly not living under fascism (and I think we can thank our Constitution and the wisdom of our founders in making it very hard to alter) for that) - there have been some very disturbing echos of some of it’s rhetoric in our current administration.

Oh, for crying out loud! What utter nonsense. What, precisely, are these "disturbing echo[e]s" of fascism from the current administration?

“disturbing echos in some of it’s rhetoric”

Such as?

Rather than repeat it here, I discusses it in this post: GREAT LEADER blames DOJ and FBI for rigging election

I think there are some similarities, but I also think our constitution prevents it. The article is really an interesting read.

Dumbest posy of the hour.
I thought you ere referring to all the Democrats actually destroying thousands of businesses and people's lives.

not to mention calling for ending private property rights,,,

 

[progressive hunter]

[

This is a commentary on our media today, but also on our whole culture. It seems to me interesting and mostly accurate. Does it get you thinking about anything? Not looking for partisan polemic here, so much as reflection on living in political — or other — fantasies. As an old retired guy I personally have time to watch sci-fi or Marvel fantasies all day long. I’ve traveled all over the world and I must say one thing about U.S. TV and film culture (I don’t do gaming): nobody does entertainment and fantasy as well as we do. I’m reminded of an old saying I first heard from a conservative South American friend: “Americans are the best entertained and the worst informed people in the whole world.”

***

Today, the liberal U.S. establishment is congratulating itself for having waged a resistance to authoritarianism... What is playing out is an increasingly extreme divergence of narrative from reality, on all sides: a phenomenon that some have termed “political virtualism,” or even “dreampolitik.”

Among the conservative base, there is no consensus about accepting the unfavorable election results and moving on. Instead, the fantasies everywhere seem to be getting more powerful....

The fantasy of a planet led by a benevolent liberal hegemon has proven no less destructive in reality than Trump’s strongman appeal ... Unsustainable on its own terms, the benevolent hegemon narrative appears to be undergoing a slow and painful collapse....

OUR WIDER CULTURE is to blame for this style of American virtual politics.... Foretold by certain far-sighted U.S. commentators in the past, entertainment has so thoroughly colonized all spheres of life that the election of a reality television star as president becomes not just possible but a logical outcome.

AT THE START of the information age — decades before social media, reality television, and cable news — the historian Daniel Boorstin warned that such a challenge to American democracy was on the horizon: the threat of fantasy. As Boorstin wrote in his 1962 book “The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America,” an extremely powerful culture industry had already begun to reshape the consciousness of Americans in a way that could blind them to the realities of their own country....

To put it another way, the channel is being changed from “The Apprentice” back to “The West Wing.”

Biden’s Win Trades One Political Fantasy for Another



Please do not use caps with thread titles. Thank you. Tom Paine 1949

This article and that Times itself, are, sort of ironic reflections of the very things this piece is talking about.

Both are Gas Lights, and no where in either do they, I am sure, really ever want to mention the role of NGO's, corporate supported foundations, or the interlocking directorate in forming the global fascism that supports the consensus of Neo-liberalism and Neo-conservatism.

I mean hell, that whole thing about twitter blacklisting a legitimate story about Hunter Biden, and Facebook doing the same, (that NY Post story,) and then, as soon as the election is over, it coming out as true?

. . . and WHAT THE FUCK?! The INTERCEPT, sure has balls of steel and is hypocritical as hell, running a story like this, when they participated in THIS SAME DAMN SHIT?!


Are we supposed to take them seriously now?!!!

I say, FUCK OFF!

Tech censorship: how paranoid should we be?

Recently, in the comments underneath our LockdownTV YouTube videos, people have been saying that our videos are being ‘downrated’ on YouTube search. Type in Aella, or Michael Levitt, for example, and videos come above ours in the search results that are much older, viewed much fewer times, and...

unherd.com

Thanks for this interesting “Unherd” interview with the courageous journalist Glenn Greenwald, whose opinions are always worth considering carefully. Greenwald is a “leftist” now risking his life exposing the powers that be in Brazil. As I’m sure you know, he recently resigned from The Intercept, which he co-founded. I think the Intercept is still worth following, though I certainly don’t agree with everything I read there.

I think Greenwald, who famously assisted Julian Assange in getting his early whistle-blowing exposes published in major papers around the world, Assange himself, and the plight of Ed Snowden, all show how difficult it is to avoid being “played,” how difficult it is to thread the needle between corporate or popular fantasy in the U.S., foreign and domestic institutions ... to “speak truth to power” in our era.

I disagree that the big corporate media ignoring Hunter Biden news (and all the rest) is somehow a sign of “global fascism.” The Democrats and big corporate establishment media certainly played hardball with the Republicans and Trump ... but that is not fascism. The liberal Establishment media is losing its grip, and Section 230 should be revoked to break up social media monopolies, but none of what they did amounts to “fascism” — anymore than what Trumpsters tried to do all along. It was indeed just “virtual dream politics” invading the world of real politics once again.

Let's look at the definition of fascism, shall we?


fas·cism
(făsh′ĭz′əm)
n.
1. often Fascism
a. A system of government marked by centralization of authority under a dictator, a capitalist economy subject to stringent governmental controls, violent suppression of the opposition, and typically a policy of belligerent nationalism and racism.
b. A political philosophy or movement based on or advocating such a system of government.
2. Oppressive, dictatorial control.

fascism

Definition, Synonyms, Translations of fascism by The Free Dictionary

www.thefreedictionary.com

Now, while it is true, we do not have a dictator in our world paradigm of fascism, I would maintain, that all other elements seem to be coming to fruition.

Fascism - Authoritarianism, Nationalism, Militarism

Fascism - Authoritarianism, Nationalism, Militarism: There has been considerable disagreement among historians and political scientists about the nature of fascism. Some scholars, for example, regard it as a socially radical movement with ideological ties to the Jacobins of the French...

www.britannica.com

The most important, and premier element of fascism, is the dirigiste economic model, where NGO's, Foundations, and corporations are given official or unofficial control over large sections of governing power. This has clearly become the norm in most supposedly democratic nation's and their institutions. It is why most folks do not trust them anymore. If we look at the World Economic Forum, or the World Health Organization, and the various memberships associated with it, it is now clear, what is driving all policiy in professional organizations, and the world propaganda in the press. Representative government, and objective scienctific debate have no place in society anymore, it is all bully tactics and oppression from the global fascists.

Billionaires and their trillion dollar multi-national corporations, along with their bullshit propaganda do more to move populations than democratic norms.


Big tech is starting to censor all voices of dissent, and in all likelihood was instrumental in putting their guy in the White House.

Big Media has created a false narrative that ethnicity is what is important, not character, going so far as demonizing police forces for doing their job when it comes to go after criminals, regardless of their race. This is, obviously using race. . a FASCIST characteristic in politics, to divide people by race.

. . . and the entire corporate/government media complex is moving us toward an economic system that is not longer free. Small business are going out of business, and it is all planned with these revolving lock-downs which are not based on science.

That CARES ACT funneled billions of dollars to the biggest companies, while leaving the poor and small businesses to suffer and die. . . .

THAT IS FASCISM.

It is just pure “dreampolitik” and fantasy to confuse the Western liberal imperial order with fascism. Neither right nor left wing populism, not social democracy / democratic socialism, not small bourgeois democracies nor our giant corporate-dominated Federal republic can be labeled “fascist.”

“Global fascism” is even a more ridiculous fantasy description of the present world reality, in which Chinese and Russian state capitalism remain politically independent of Wall Street’s liberal / neo-con corporate system.

Your talk of “NGO's, corporate supported foundations, or the interlocking directorate ... forming the global fascism that supports the consensus of Neo-liberalism and Neo-conservatism” inserts the word “fascism” without sense or purpose whatever. Using dictionary definitions is childish, but even the ones you quoted make it clear we are NOT living under “fascism” in any sense but the surreal.

Of course the violence and terrors of life in many third world countries, or countries torn apart to serve imperialism, means the Western “liberal world order” is a nightmare for them. When you are dead it doesn’t matter whether a liberal or neo-con soldier dropped the bomb on your head, or if it was a real fascist in the pay of some lunatic fuhrer.

But it is as clear as can be that you and I are NOT living under a fascist world order. Not under Biden, and not under Trump. That is a political fantasy pushed by partisan hysterics who have never experienced or even studied real fascism.

I would argue that while we are certainly not living under fascism (and I think we can thank our Constitution and the wisdom of our founders in making it very hard to alter) for that) - there have been some very disturbing echos of some of it’s rhetoric in our current administration.

Oh, for crying out loud! What utter nonsense. What, precisely, are these "disturbing echo[e]s" of fascism from the current administration?

“disturbing echos in some of it’s rhetoric”

Such as?

Rather than repeat it here, I discusses it in this post: GREAT LEADER blames DOJ and FBI for rigging election

I think there are some similarities, but I also think our constitution prevents it. The article is really an interesting read.

Dumbest posy of the hour.
I thought you ere referring to all the Democrats actually destroying thousands of businesses and people's lives.

not to mention calling for ending private property rights,,,

Coyoye is upset that Trump criticizes policies he opposes but is thrilled when Democrats call 90% of US citizens racists.

...what ever you say dude.

Federal judge, sister of Stacey Abrams, REVERSES decision blocking two Georgia counties from removing 4,000 voters who moved…

In surprise ruling, Judge Leslie Abrams Gardner just reversed a decision from earlier this week that prevented two Georgia counties from removing over 4,000 voters from their rolls who moved away. …

therightscoop.com

 

[Thevolunteerwino]

To summerize. . in todays politics, no matter which angle you look from. . its all nothing but bs

 

[Ringtone]

Be specific.

See my prior post.

I looked at your prior post. It amounts to you, once again, giving absolutely no examples of Trump mouthing the rhetoric or advocating the policies of fascism. Instead, you allude to instances of real fascism and implicate Trump and his supporters in terms of something or another having to do with political rallies. This is the stuff of sheer demagoguery.

Once again, give specifics, please, into which members of this board can sink their teeth.

Moreover, the concern with so-called fraud for those of us who understand the imperatives of constitutional law goes to the failure of several state legislatures to exert their prerogative in the face of executive and judiciary officials unconstitutionally overriding their state's respective laws governing the manner in which elections are to be conducted and the manner in which electors are to be appointed.

Only the several states' legislatures are granted that power in the Constitution!

That observation is not the stuff conspiracies. Those are the facts.

There's absolutely no question that the law was violated, statutorily and constitutionally. There's no question that votes, overwhelmingly for Biden, were illegitimately counted. The real issue is not whether or not voter fraud was so widespread that it would have changed the result relative to the votes that were counted. The issue is that votes were illegitimately counted and, now, we will never know just how many of those were included in the total. Also, we have states in which shenanigans clearly did occur precisely because of the loosey-goosey procedures that were allowed to take place unchecked. We can’t have this kind of crap going on. It erodes trust.

Unaudited results where certified in key states!

This could have and should have been stopped cold by SCOTUS before the election but for that imbecile Roberts.

The Constitution was violated. It casts a shadow of doubt over the outcome. Tens of millions have every right to be outraged and suspicious in the face of a flagrant violation of constitutional law and an egregious lack of proper accountability.

BTW, I’m going to post the latter part of this under another OP babbling about voter-fraud conspiracies sans any mention of the real issues: constitutional law and voter confidence.

 

[Tom Paine 1949]

Reminder to all: Please try to stay on topic and avoid partisan polemics, statements and challenges.

The aim of this thread is to examine — in a thoughtful and essentially non-partisan way — the general nature of fantasy, “virtual reality” and “dreampolitik” in American life.